Disqus - Latest Comments for ksablan

Re: How Should the Quality of a Writer’s Work Be Measured?

Kevin Sablan — Tue, 19 Aug 2014 11:16:54 -0000

The Time Inc. spreadsheet measures a journalist's value to the company, not the "quality* of her or his work. "Quality of writing" actually appears in its own a column; it's one of eight criteria used in the evaluation.

I could imagine similar sheets being used by music publishers to decide which band or singer should be kept or dropped. Artists that produce the highest quality music aren't necessarily the ones that are most valuable to the company.

Successful businesses make decisions that produce a (positive) return on their investment.

All that said:
1. Advertisers typically want to reach specific audiences.
2. Publishers typically build target audiences by writing about specific topics.
3. Covering those topics benefit relationships with advertisers.

Time Inc. should attach "beneficial to advertiser relationship" to a spreadsheet that evaluates beats, not writers. If a writer covers a beat effectively, but it's not a topic that advertisers value, she or he should not be penalized. The people who chose the beat should be held accountable instead.

Re: Dumping the newspaper

Kevin Sablan — Thu, 24 Jul 2014 15:58:02 -0000

Thanks for sharing the post, Adam. I wasn't aware of that David Ho piece. I'll make sure to read it.

Re: Something weird is going on with Twitter

Kevin Sablan — Fri, 20 Sep 2013 12:05:16 -0000

I was going to mention this on Twitter, but you might not see it there. Twitter might be "helping" you and other verified users with a new feature that blocks, er filters out, non-verified users from your "connect" tab.

http://thenextweb.com/twitt...

Re: Myspace Parent Specific Media Edges Out Google AdWords

Kevin Sablan — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 12:09:56 -0000

Thanks for picking up on the post, Richard.

Re: Halo of Flies

Kevin Sablan — Wed, 06 Jun 2012 05:06:40 -0000

I really like this idea and I think it could work nicely for people who think and write in a very organized manner. To that point, it could be used to help teach people how to transform their thoughts into words and sentences that make sense structurally.

Re: Facebook’s “Social Readers” Still Fading

Kevin Sablan — Wed, 23 May 2012 09:20:51 -0000

"But as a Facebook user, I don’t really care — I’m just glad I don’t have to see these things anymore." Maybe Facebook listened to you and other users, and had its engineers "twist the dials" to align more closely with your wants. If users overwhelmingly *wanted* to use those readers, I think Facebook would have either kept the dials the same or cranked it up to have reader posts display more prominently since they can legitimately count the time people spend in readers towards "time spent on Facebook".

Re: Lifestream Blog Celebrates 5 Year Birthday Thanks to You

Kevin Sablan — Sun, 18 Mar 2012 03:57:53 -0000

Happy birthday, blog, and thank you, Mark.

Re: Research shows just 6% of companies value listening online

Kevin Sablan — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 13:50:49 -0000

The 6% in the title of this post refers to a question about INTERDEPARTMENTAL INTEGRATION, not how much companies "value listening." The question appears on page 8 of the study: "How integrated are your listening and digital engagement initiatives across marketing, sales, and customer service?"

Here is a link to "Listening And Engaging In The Digital Marketing Age" (PDF), the July 2011 report that Get Satisfaction used to create the visuals. http://i.dell.com/sites/content/corporate/secure/en/Documents/listening-and-engaging-in-the-digital-marketing-age.pdf

A company can place great value on listening online, and devote large amounts of resources to online engagement, but still fail to communicate those efforts across its various divisions.

Only 6% of respondents say their listening initiatives are "very integrated," meaning that they "track and measure the impact that listening has on each discipline."

62% of respondents say their listening initiatives are "somewhat integrated" and they "share insights or results with other divisions." They might not "track and measure the impact" of their initiatives, but they have insights and results that they share with other divisions. That does not mean that those companies simply don't value listening.

Another 28% say that their listening initiatives are "not very integrated." They "inform other divisions about activity," although they fail to share insights or results. Each division might be working hard at listening, and they talk to each other about what they're doing. What they fail to do is share results. That does not mean that they don't value listening online.

Only 4% of the companies surveyed say that their listening initiatives are not integrated at all. "Each division operates in isolation." This doesn't mean that they don't listen online. It only means that their divisions don't speak or listen to each other about listening.

An page 7 of the report, companies are asked about which ways they "listen to and engage with customers online." A full 88% of the respondents say that they "monitor online feedback and conversation." Since devote resources to listening, it's fair to say that they value online listening. Research shows 88% of companies listen online.

Although the report never directly asks companies to share how much the "value" listening, page 9 comes close, showing that 36% of the respondents agree or strongly agree that "listening and digital engagement initiatives are corporate objectives set by executive management." 30% neither agree nor disagree, and 32% say that they disagree or strongly disagree.

Re: Five Great Resources for Bloggers

Kevin Sablan — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 00:27:38 -0000

Good post, sir. I also find "other bloggers" to be a great resource, especially for people who are just beginning to blog.

Under social media, some tools to help find the most useful updates might be helpful. Twitter's advanced search is indispensable. My6sense and Summify also help me filter through the echo chamber.

Re: 10 Tips For Making The Most Of Twitter

Kevin Sablan — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 04:19:13 -0000

It's great to see the blog back up and running, Craig. Great tips. I especially like Sree's last one, that every tweet should have a link. Then again, I might be a little biased about that one.

Re: Three Years Later, the Guardian Wants a Buyer for PaidContent

Kevin Sablan — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 13:40:20 -0000

If your sources are right, and Kara Swisher's report was accurate a few years ago, then Gaurdian might be selling at half the price of the $30 million they paid. http://allthingsd.com/20080...

Re: Revealed: Why Techmeme links to them instead of you! - Techmeme News

Kevin Sablan — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 08:55:42 -0000

Thank you for this, Gabe. Do these same concepts apply to your sister sites like MediaGazer?

Re: Top 10 Most Important Google News Ranking Factors

Kevin Sablan — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 16:52:14 -0000

Thank you, Andrew. Do you have an inkling of where website traffic falls in the list of ranking factors?

Re: Top 10 Most Important Google News Ranking Factors

Kevin Sablan — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 13:43:38 -0000

Thank you for this. I have one question about the Shehata quote. He says that if you "get clicks/traffic, you will become an authority on that topic." Is he talking about clicks from within Google News and other search engine results pages (as indicated in the chart), or just general traffic not related to search engines? Does site traffic in general contribute to the algorithm? I've never seen it listed as a contributing factor, but these algorithms change so frequently that something might have changed.

Re: http://www.stoweboyd.com/post/10359582401

Kevin Sablan — Sun, 18 Sep 2011 17:50:26 -0000

I'm still using it, but a recent change to Google Apps has made it confusing/difficult because G+ isn't available for Google Apps, and I have a "conflicting account." Rather than constantly logging in and for YouTube, Reader, Docs, etc., I simply use some services less than before.

Re: Twitter User Galleries Start Rolling Out Today

Kevin Sablan — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 00:32:34 -0000

Hey there, Matt. I stumbled across a Twitter account that has the new feature enabled: https://twitter.com/coryOCo...

Re: Huffington insists her traffic isn’t down

Kevin Sablan — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 11:54:41 -0000

If anyone else is wondering, that is 118,194,000 to 114,000,000 unique visitors.

Re: Can we use web metrics to improve print products?

Kevin Sablan — Sat, 07 May 2011 05:25:02 -0000

As usual, good post @Adam Tinworth . I wonder if the reverse could be true. Instead of looking for online success to help decide what to cut from the current publishing package, maybe those topics that receive the most attention online could signal other (gasp) print products that might fare well if separated from the package.

That doesn't necessarily mean another newspaper, but maybe a magazine, or even a small book. Of course, we need to think first about the sustainability of those products. A magazine that relies on ad revenue as its main source of income might not be the best idea. Books might not be such a great idea either, since their sales are declining. But ebook sales are increasing, which brings the idea over to new digital products.

So maybe we can use web metrics to create new digital products. If certain types of photos are popular, maybe they can be turned into calendars. If a disparate collection of articles, blog posts and galleries centered around a particular storyline is popular, maybe those could be pulled together into an more consumer-friendly ebook. If the expertise of a certain columnist gains popularity, would it be okay to charge readers for in-person presentations and workshops by that columnist?

We might also want to use more than just *web* metrics to make these decisions. Certain topics that create more-than-average discussion on social networks. Mobile analytics might reveal other potential ideas.

Re: How accurate is the Facebook Like count?

Kevin Sablan — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 01:26:55 -0000

Sue, thank you for noticing the post and sharing the information with your readers.

Re: An Interesting Way To Blog Links (From Ryan Sholin)

Kevin Sablan — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 11:21:26 -0000

I'm glad you all are experimenting with this stuff. I say give Ryan's method a shot and see how it works out for you. I also really like Will Sullivan's unique approach on http://journerdism.com .

Re: Topsy: Now Searching Tweets Back To May 2008

Kevin Sablan — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 12:56:12 -0000

Thanks again for another useful post, Danny. For what it's worth, Snap Bird - http://snapbird.org - also lets you search for tweets past the week or so that Twitter Search provides. Unfortunately, it does not have robust advanced search options.

Re: Top 10 YouTube News Bloopers

Kevin Sablan — Mon, 31 May 2010 12:40:02 -0000

I second that, Vadim. That's the first thing I searched for when I viewed this post.

Re: My next chapter: Joining Mashable

Kevin Sablan — Sat, 15 May 2010 00:40:24 -0000

How the heck did I miss this yesterday? Congratulations, Mashable!

Re: Google’s Secret Plan to Save Newspapers: Sell More Expensive Ads

Kevin Sablan — Tue, 11 May 2010 10:16:21 -0000

Hard but necessary.

Re: Google’s Secret Plan to Save Newspapers: Sell More Expensive Ads

Kevin Sablan — Tue, 11 May 2010 09:22:14 -0000

Thank you for the capsulized version of Fallows' article.

I agree with all but the last three words of this sentence. "That stuff won’t matter, though, unless newspapers can cut a lot of costs and make a lot more money from online ads." Must revenue come solely from advertisements? Are news organizations capable of profitably producing any other products/services? I'm hopeful that the answer is yes.